Medillin, Colombia

September 22nd - 23rd

The bus ride from Cartagena to Medellin was 13-plus hours...that is long enough for anyone, however, when the bus driver is cranky, it just makes everyone equally cranky...and of course, we were FREEZING UNNECESSARILY. PS - plastic bags as leg-warmers, not super effective but good in a bind. Also, even the weather outside is Sahara hot, never board a South American bus without ALL THE CLOTHES YOU OWN! Luckily, we had some entertainment in the form of an older woman that sat to the other side of Hannah - she would just do really random things that made us smile, like spend a solid 20 minutes picking tangerine peels out of the bottom of her purse, have no hesitations walking right on into the men's bathroom at our rest stop, and then returning to her seat...in the bus next to ours! It made us smile lots - and she did realize her mistake eventually. However, we paid for our entertainment...in the form of REVENGE! The lady for some reason transported a cooler full of dead fish. Well, the ride was a bit windy and bumpy...thus, all the fish juice had run out and ONTO OUR BACKPACKS! Yes, we smelled of rotten fish for THE ENTIRE metro ride to center city and the walk to our hostal. Basically, people moved for us...we could literally part crowds instantly. It was like a superpower... whose consequences included smelling like sewage run-off. After the lady who checked us into the hostal graciously excused herself (probably to dry heave) a few times, we headed up to our PRIVATE room and spent the rest of the morning washing and drying EVERYTHING! Not going to lie, the city urine smell was a welcome one compared to what we emitted! Hostel Odeon...you are our savior! Clean, bug free PRIVATE rooms with towels, a mini fridge, windows, and TV!! DONE!


After a couple hours of washing, Febreezing, and washing again, we heded our to explore the city. In the heart of Medellin sits Plaza Bolivar, littered with replicas of Botero statues leading to the doors of Museo de Antioquia, a large collection or various artwork spread out amongst its four floors. Also, it was the first time we were able to use our youth cards to get in for free, saving us $8000, which we later used to buy groceries for dinner! The fastest exhibits were Botero's (just not a fan) and the portraits collection from the 1600s. The greatest piece was an abstract/mixed media that had paintbrushes and parts of various musical instruments emerging out of the canvas background! Once our brains became overwhelmed with art knowledge, we walked around town and did what we do best...people-watch. Medellin is the perfect town for someone with ADD and a little bit of street smarts...at times, overstimulating but never dull. According to Lonely Planet, there was a bookstore with a decent collection of English books, so we of course checked it out. Usually LP doesn't mislead anyone too badly, but the get a thumbs down on this one - it was a woman sitting in front of a glass case containing about 22 books, 4 of which were in English - LAME! We gathered necessary veggies for the usual tomato/cucumber/avocado salad and ate it in our OWN room, while flipping channels until landing on...drumroll please..."Dawson's Creek!" Hannah and I apologize to everyone involved in our lives during the stage of our lives where we actually thought this was a good show...we are sorry.




Relaxing after a loooong art education!

The second day consisted of jamming to great tunes and seeking out the significance of the word "mona," which Hannah and I were getting called a lot. Though we assumed it had something to do with being gringas (doesn't it always?), we confirmed with the confused gentlemen at the tourist information booth. Diplomatically, he said "it means someone with lighter hair." "Neither of us has light-colored hair." "Well, it means maybe a fairer being..." "So, it means 'whitey?'" "Well...yes." "Thanks, that is what we thought, we just wanted to make sure." Pumped with our new-found knowledge, we headed to another nearby park and stumbled upon an amazing quartet of musicians who played Vallenato classics for the rather significant yet still intimate crowd of fans that had formed beneath the trees' scattered shade. Obviously, we joined and enjoyed the infectious harmonies and the perfect blend of musicality that three guitars and a cheese grater can provide! As they sang, one older gentleman in particular observed them, us, ans everyone else with the same mouth agape, half grin/half shocked expression - almost as though he was dumbfounded or at a loss for words...just for the ENTIRE morning. He made us smile lots! Luckily, you too can enjoy his awesomeness on the right in the picture below. Once someone in the crown made a comment about "monas" and "cameras," we decided that was a perfect opportunity to explore a little more. Of course, we circled back around to catch a few more tunes within about 30 minutes of leaving the park. This time, we admired the creativity of a child sitting across from us in the park...until we realized the device he was making served as a launcher of grass and other earth-like elements...at us! Oh Medellin, never a dull moment, and we thank you for that!



Getting to our flight was quite eventful, thanks to the ridiculous security for passengers leaving Colombia. They REALLY don't want you to bring ANYTHING, other than coffee, out of that country! So, start with two separate officials that checked your ticket validity prior to entering the "security" area! Next, the usual x-ray station where they avidly discouraged the removal of shoes. Walk through metal detector. Get a 360-degree hand-held wand search from another official. Pat down from a female officer. Then, further down to the station where the police (whose main job is to keep drugs in their country?) opened each carry-on and went through it all, one item at a time. The officer (PO1) started with our deflated playground ball - she removed it, smelled it, shook it, and flipped it. Next, she held out the bag of plastic utensils (which we have strategically collected from the good places) with a very questionable look on her face, paused for a diva moment, and moved on to the peanut butter. Oh gosh. She looked at it, shook it, opened it, and took a deep whiff of it...I literally thought she was going to sample it with her pinky finger. (In Spanish to the other officer - PO2 - who was doing...NOTHING) PO1: "They have large containers of this in America, my mom says." PO2: "What is it?" PO1: "Peanut butter." PO2: "What do you do with it?" Us: "Well, you can make sandwiches with that and marmalade, or simply put it on crackers..." PO2: Makes a confused/disgusted face, reaches over and grabs it from PO1, shakes it, opens it, smells it, hesitates, makes a semi-dry heave face, puts the lid back and hands it back to PO1! Ummm...WHAAAAAAAAAAAT? Are we on candid camera? Does this really happen? This is RIDICULOUS but simultaneously hysterical! Thankfully, we only had one person in the security line ahead of us...can you imagine how long this process would take if you even had 10 people ahead of you? Years...you would need to go back and get a VISA! After another 3-4 minutes of inspecting our food bag and making what began as "really?" looks that soon turned into more pitying looks with each collection of "probably useful sometime" things that she extracted (ie napkins, salt and pepper packets, little ice cream sample spoons, etc), she then moved on to our personal belonging bags. Status of PO2: still doing nothing, but now looks like he might be contemplating the uses of peanut butter...or maybe remembering that he left the stove on? The process went much the same for our backpacks. With my other most valuable items, I packed some individually-wrapped dark chocolates that my parents sent in a care package :) Well, apparently that looks suuuuppppeeeerrr sketch...thus, a repeat of the PB inspection. PO1 shook the Ziploc of chocolates, dragged her nose along the top of the Ziploc while sniffing intently, opened it, removed one chocolate, and repeated the exact same process. To lighten the mood a little, and to ensure her I wasn't trying to smuggle drugs out of her country, I asked her if she wanted one. PO1: "What kind of chocolate is it?" Me: "It's pretty dark...about 72%." PO1: "It's sweet?" Me: "Not really." PO1: Fake dry heave with the tongue out and everything, then throws the chocolate back in the Ziploc and moves onto the next item! During the rest of the search, she kept asking us what other countries we were visiting. A common theme we have discovered among Colombians...any other country outside of Colombia "es feo!" We would endulge her a little with conversation, but that ended once she kept saying, "ahh, Ecuador...es feo! Y Peru?...Es mas feo!" DANG LADY! HARSH! What usually quiets them down is when you ask if they have ever traveled to them, which is what I asked her...you will find that 93% of the time, the answer is no. Oh gosh, Colombia - you have some die-hard patriots in your country! Once we got past security, all was well. One of our in-flight options of entertainment was watching the "Beiber" episode of "Glee!" Not super important, but it reminded me of my lovely "Caucasian" friends...I miss you ladies!

Next up... QUITO, ECUADOR! Miss everyone from home...mucho!